A Streetbike Named Electra

XSR700
By Angelo Agathangelou: A rather sexy motorcycle has arrived at our UK residence thanks, as far as we know, to some designers and paper pushers at the Yamaha Corporation in Japan, some French factory workers in Rouvroy, France and other unidentified miners etc. and my wallet growing lighter to the tune of a whacking great wad of cash. We are very grateful to the makers.

The choice was deliberate and not in a value proposition way, but in terms of road use fun and the expectation was that at the very least the rubber and suspension would need upgrading ASAP. Handy then that the bike is designed to be modified. Those looking for the true value proposition have the MT-07.
...Why not spend that extra cash on an XSR900? Well my race spec. Yamaha Genesis from the 1980s is a very special machine indeed, let alone the monsters that represent that sector in 2020. Such beautiful balance, such capability, such great fun on a track, so safe on the public highway thanks to its tremendous capabilities and so boring to ride within spitting distance of UK speed limit big sister fascism.

...Goldwings are great, but they look like arse and though the latest bagger version is passable it's not on the list for the practical aspect I'm looking for in ancient English city environments like London, Bath and Bristol, primarily due to the worsening parking issues, because I assure you that a well piloted current Goldwing can filter in cities and kick inexperienced R1 poser arse, without trying too hard.

The XSR900 is the obvious, but wrong choice. First, it's as ugly as a Goldwing, but you don't get the benefit of a great fairing as compensation for its ugliness. Secondly it's got that look at my muscles thing going on, feels like a boy, don't ride boys, or it's just the wrong sort of girl... Engine sounds boring.

The XSR700 on the other hand is our Goldilocks. Ouch that pure motorcycle design, ooh those sharp garage metal looks, grin from ear to ear at that sweet engine. Many clammer after a stubby headlight, because one dude made a cool stubby. I liked the dude's Super 7 stubby design and I love the light as it is and get the original designer's point too. I'll be keeping mine stock.


She's lighter than expected for her 689cc fighting weight and that's always a good thing. Somehow at drive way speeds, her light weight counts for nothing verses my old first of the R1200GS models BMW presumably due to the centre of gravity. Nevertheless the light weight is reflected in the bike's agility on the move and to repeat a word often used to describe the XSR700 'fun' nature. In fact I'm told that in the next edition of the Oxford concise English dictionary, the Yamaha XSR700 will be used as exemplar of the word 'fun'.

Got it? If you haven't picked up yet what the character of this bike is from the many other opinions available, it's simply 'fun' thanks to a gem of an engine that is not only entertaining to use, but also pulls of the neat trick of returning around 50mpg from my invariably faster than everyone else on the road pace. Dude's saving the planet.

She's a hot chick out of the box, but Yamaha need to stay in business on the one hand so there are signs of that and on the other hand we have the Euro technocrat arse munchers intent on buggering up our fun, and rendering it somewhat whimsical so there's the arse sagging effect of that on the otherwise cool looking exhaust and elsewhere, lest we forget the hen pecked castratos currently pretending we're a democracy here in Feminist Nanny State UK and there you have it, ...our lovely girl is born into what some experts are now referring to as 'a munted shit show'.

The aforementioned 'humanity' makes it all the more remarkable that a cynical old biker could find the XSR700 to be a diamond in the rough, but 4 years of data and eight weeks in and I certainly find that to be the case.
 

Buying:
Don't let bigger outlets like Fowlers of Bristol Jew you, because they will if they can get away with it. Do your research for best prices available and go elsewhere if necessary as a matter of principal. Some of the boys and girls at Fowlers are bikers [invariably decent bonkers sorts bikers], but don't forget that they are there to make money for their bosses and they will clean you out given half a chance. Having said that, I personally went for the overpriced new colours, because the bike has to looks right, I'm not making a budget choice, that's not the point of this exercise for me, I'll be spending much more to make her right, could have bought an R9T, ...but nobody deserves to be Jewed.


Engine:
The CP2 engine is the throbbing heart and soul of this rough diamond. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde she will gently thrum around town at low revs when there are rozzers and nanny cams about, but given a few extra degrees of throttle the girl has all the beans you could ever want on a public road. ??? Yes that last statement may seem as if someone snipped The Dude's nads, ...all I can say is, I feel you, but experience has shown me that there's a right amount of power and that Moto GP level performance is a] boring on a public highway, ...I probably love foreplay more than the next biker, but dag nam it I need to go balls deep and ejaculate every now and then too and b] a liability to your licence, because well set up track bikes are so deceptively fast that, "There was no way I was going 95mph around Staples Corner Roundabout on my Yamaha Genesis Osifer!" ...Honestly one simply doesn't realise sometimes how fast one's going.

"I ran over a woman the other day on my motorcycle."

We can get into plenty of trouble on a capable 186kg motorcycle with 75hp-ish v all-comers baring hyper expensive hyper cars with sub-3-second 0-60 abilities, or run of the mill sports bikes equipped with capable pilots.

What a stupid place to have the ignition key, especially if you spec up with the knuckle protectors, which renders it a full ministry of crap design issue. My key has been a pain to use. 


It feels as if the fuelling could do with minor tweaking, but I happen to be in possession of one of the world's most sophisticated computers 'the human brain' and it's compensating nicely with the hand at the throttle, no need to mess with that setup at the moment.

Chassis:
Adequate.

Suspension:
The suspension is adequate for boring commuting and we can have fun, we can have whimsical fun, but it's inadequate for serious, or ultimate fun. After an upgrade of rubber this will be my focus for a final solution. ...I'm feeling the 'Andreani fork cartridges', but I'll take suggestions if there's anything better and in my case I need to be prepared to give my shagg buddy of the day a lift every now and then, so adjustability is required for the mono-shock too. I've heard that Nitron has poor customer service, I'm not sure where Hagon fits into the mix. I'm looking for plush and planted. 


I'll see how good our local JHS Racing here in Bristol are with advice and update.

Tyres:
Yamaha, or Pirelli may have seen FortNine's exposé on the manufacturers tyre scam, because somehow the tread looks deeper than 3mm, but that doesn't seem to matter as I can confirm that the stock rubber needs to be upgraded at the first service with something superior v the constantly rainy UK environment. I'll be trying out the appropriate direct replacement Michelin 5s, or are there better wet and dry i.e. all-around performers given that in this case unusually price and longevity are not an issue and ultimate wet weather performance married to better than stock dry performance for short journeys?

 

Switchgear:
The Missenden Flyer was spot on about the switchgear. It's mostly superior to BMW. The horn could have been moved elsewhere, but in time our hand eye coordination improves to deal with the issue. The horn is the gayest i've ever heard. I don't usually care, but this XSR700 one's embarrassing. Candidate for minor upgrade.
 

Gay Security:
Trackers make my arse twitch. For me trackers are antithetical to biking. Convicts ware trackers. Nevertheless thanks to the money grubbing globalists who off-shored local industrial jobs so that they could be a tiny bit richer and the military industrial complex as we were warned by US president Eisenhower, now in the full time employ of the warmongering Jewish lobby accounting for well over 95% of world armed conflicts since the end of WWII, half of us are war migrants and the rest are jobless, ain't that a bitch?

So here we are, society exists online and hardly in reality, the boob tube has been more or less a propaganda matrix designed to divide and conquer us along gender and race lines, because the family is the greatest threat to the state so that today our countries are towers of babel. We forgot the old wisdoms, babel, usury, debt jubilees and so much more, so that whereas in the past in many places one could safely leave their doors unlocked, today we know not to live on the ground floor, because you have a higher likelihood of having your habitat jacked and reported motorcycle theft has statistically quadrupled and more over the last decade. It's a sign of the times that saddens me deeply.
 

The gay security stuff includes a chemically bonded to quality mature concrete Torc shackle, Abus' top loop chain and lock and disc-lock, 'Stealth' tracker, alarm and crossbow. You have to be careful with the crossbow as it's quite powerful and will pass straight through the thief and possibly damage someones property and damage the expensive shaft too. Handy if you can catch the thief in front of a tree so you can more or less nail them to it, which also makes shaft retrieval easier. You don't want the thief running away with your expensive arrows/exhibit 'A', plus, nailed to a tree, you have the time not only to eventually retrieve your arrow, but also an opportunity to point out that getting nailed to a tree is The Dude's idea of a final warning and something about concrete boots and little fish being involved in any future final episode. ...I Jest

The Gearbox:
Neural to first involves a serious clunk. Works well to catapult you to the bike's limit in no time flat.

The XSR700 works well in cities, but is a pain to ride on the motorway as you are more or less sitting on top of the bike with zero wind protection.

A classic Dart screen suits the bike [the darkest version suits the 2020 White/Red colours and Black shade well and hides some if the wiring mess] and takes the edge off to make the motorway a tad more tolerable, but not by much. I've ordered a larger Puig Bat screen to try out in the future, but the gay, look how dumb our governments are, pandemic lockdown seems to have quartered the speed of the postal services so it's not here yet.

The Chain:
Aren't chains gay. I've been spoilt by BMWs.


The Exhaust:
Looks cool, sounds good. Of course I would love to lose some weight off the stock exhaust, but I don't want to be a southpark FAG, so I'm staying with the stock exhaust and maybe she gets an akrapovic aniversery gift. My favourite looking aftermarket exhaust is the 70s SC Project, but I get the impression it sounds FAG loud in the flesh.

Summary:

The Good: Light, excellent engine, cool.

The Bad: Budget suspension, budget con tyres.

We can fix the bad with money, so add a huge wad of cash worth of suspension and rubber upgrades + time. I would pay XSR900 money for an XSR700SP. Yamaha realise that, so they offer a bunch of Ohlins upgrades. I want to know if Ohlins is actually the best quality and performancewise and not just the most well known and I'd love to know what weight penalty we pay for various brands because I aim for her to end up weighing less than stock.

Aftermath:
Wouldn't it be cool if Yamaha manufacturers offered tyre upgrades, especially if ordering a bike that has yet to be built. The OEM can't lose.

Need a center stand.

I'm glad that so far the breaks are adequate and don't squeak. The clutch could have been lighter. The ergonomics are good for me at an athletic 5' 10" with 32 leg trousers. 


Yamaha's XSR700 is proving to be a real hoot, I wouldn't be spending a further huge wad of cash to upgrade the suspension and rubber otherwise. I'm thinking she's a keeper. She has soul, so I had to give her a name and I'm a Greek males' rights Dude so there are plenty of cool options, ...her name is Electra.

Electra's Sound Track
Powered by Cardo + JBL

Mellow Side

Wind Song - Wes Montgomery

Dark Side
Deux Ex Machina - MotorPsycho

Stay tuned...